The pair of motorbikes that blocked an attacking Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) on stage 14 of the Tour de France have been suspended from the race for stage 15, with both the riders and passengers also fined.
The side of the roads were thronging with walls of spectators as the two main protagonists in the yellow jersey battle, Pogačar and race leader Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma), approached the summit of the Col de Joux Plane. But when Pogačar attacked 500 metres from the top for the bonus seconds, his vicious acceleration was quickly cut short.
The two motorbikes ahead had not left enough space to avoid getting in the way of the sortie they were there to capture unfolding.
The decision from the jury of commissaires stated that there had been a "violation of traffic regulations or directives vehicles in the race (non-compliance with the press specifications before the Col de Joux Plane bonus sprint)."
The drivers and passengers, a cameraman from broadcaster France Télévisions and photographer from L'Equipe, were each fined 500 CHF along with the stage 15 suspension.
They weren't the only ones removed from the race, with a motorbike containing an AFP photographer also excluded for the second day in the Alps and fined due to a separate incident involving a breach of the traffic regulations or directives.
"When I saw that Pogačar was attacking, I told my driver who told me that he simply can't take off," L'Equipe photographer Bernard Papon told the newspaper. "When he came up to us, we found ourselves in a tricky situation. The crowd was so thick that you have to make a choice in the heat of the moment – interrupt the rider's effort or fall in with the crowd and hurt people.
"I'm not going to defend the indefensible – you shouldn't find yourself in this kind of situation. I should have asked my driver to get going faster and earlier. Next time I'll speed up and not take the photo, too bad. The rules are all there for this situation. We made a mistake and I'm very sorry for Tadej Pogačar and for the show."
After the stage Pogačar said the interrupted effort was "a wasted bullet".
“To do one sprint for nothing is a bit of a shame, but I don’t think it’s going to change the final outcome. It stayed in the legs, and I couldn’t sprint for the bonus. OK, I messed it up a little bit. But it is what is," he said.
Adam Yates, Pogačar’s key lieutenant, was more forthright when asked about motorbikes impeding the racing, saying in an interview on the FloBikes YouTube channel that it’s "an absolute disgrace".
"If you look at the helicopter shot and see how many motorbikes there are and how many fans there are on the side of the road we barely have any field to play with so yeah, it's the Tour de France, it's a circus and everyone is expecting it, but it's not easy.”
While Pogačar ended up being beaten to the line for the time bonus by Vingegaard at the top of the climb of the Col de Joux Plane, he reversed the order in the sprint for second on the finish line.
That meant he lost one second on the first day in the Alps, leaving Vingegaard with a ten-second lead heading into stage 15, which will tackle its succession of climbs with three less motorbikes out on the course.
